I'll always have a human in my roster but he usually just ends up being the pack rat of the crew. I prefer Dark Elf, Dwarf, Orc, Half Elf, Kajiit , Chua or whatever other race can do the class I most prefer rolling with at the time. There will always be lots of humans in rpg's since we're all playing one huge mmo as it is.
Characters for me are cast members. I tend to role play them right from the start, at creation and how I plan to play them out is determined by what I choose in character creation.
The most common for me are Valkyrie like females that tend to be human like. Quiet male observer types are common too. They will have a personality and with other races there tend to be focused personalities I wasn't associating with my character. As appealing as Castanic were, I never really played a Female Castanic. Hobbit didn't have the qualities I tend to role play in to my characters, as much as I loved Miqo'te the look, I never played one. In ESO an Orc looked grand but they had a social structure I knew I couldn't role play to truth. Wood Elf and High Elf I could.
Well, since this thread has turned from "why play a human if you're not forced to" to "what do you like to play":
- I always play what D&D calls "lawful good". Just what I am in reallife, too. I dont roleplay much, if at all. I do however create a "real" person, with a good name etc. I really dont like it when the game forces me to play evil "because you're a darkelf" or some such garbage. Just because I am race X doesnt change the fact I am sentient and have free will, thank you very much.
- I play male and female characters about equally. Sorry, but I happen to love women. Thus I dont see whats the problem with me playing one, just because I'm a man. If YOU have a problem with that, well sorry, but thats really exclusively your own problem alone, and not mine. I dont identify with my female characters, but then again I dont identify with most of my male characters either. They are just people to me, people I created with my mind, but people nevertheless. I often pick one of my characters and identify with him a little bit, though. But thats one special character, usually my main, and only if I really feel comfortable with the game. That means for example that I can make him a darkelf and make him look great.
- I want to look great. That doesnt automatically mean beautiful. But it means stylish. I want my Orcs to look ugly, but also very male and heroic. So for example give them a strong chin, and strong eyebrows. Kind of like the player Halforc in the D&D 3.0 and 3.5 Player Handbooks. So make them have no nose whatsoever, just a hole, but dont give them ugly knobs for a nose. First they cant breathe through that and second it seriously lacks in respect to heroism. In general dont make them look like a pig, and like a really ugly pig on top of that. I dont mind pig races, but then give them a matching beautiful rosa skin. Thats why I hated Vanguard orcs, they always looked truely ugly. My Vanguard Goblin though was fine - ugly, sure, but with a bit of twiddling I managed a heroic look.
- I love playing underdog races. My favorite is darkelf. I really hate it though if the devs make the skin so black you cant really see facial features anymore (Darkelves in Neverwinter Nights 2). I rather want a grayish, violettish or blueish tone in the skin. I also hate it when elves are simply outright ugly (Baldurs Gate, Neverwinter Nights 2, Elder Scrolls etc).
- Other underdog races I like playing are gnomes, orc or halforc, and halfelf.
- I dont like it when darkelves are considered black people, orcs are plants or any such garbage. Darkelves are black skinned and red eyed because they are cursed for their anchestors turned to dark magic. The dark of their skin doesnt protect them from direct sunlight at all, and it also basically blinds them. Orcs are people too, and people are sentient. Thus they are not plants or any such stupid thing. Just leave all illogical sentient races to where they belong to (Star Trek: Voyager) and move on.
- I especially really hate animal races that do not even have room for a sentient brain in their head. Thats a major insult to basic common sense. I'm looking at you, Vanguard.
- I dont like non-underdog races much, like human, highelf, woodelf, and especially I strongly dislike dwarf.
- I really, really hate it when games try to force you playing halflings and/or gnomes as a kind of shorter dwarf.
- The only dwarves I ever loved playing have been Lineage 2 female dwarves. Thats because they looked to me like I want gnomes to look like. Also I had no choice, I wanted a crafter and in Lineage 2, only dwarf can be crafter.
- I only play human if the game outright forces me, because all other races are b*s* ugly (Neverwinter Nights 2), or if they are really beautiful (Breton in Elder Scrolls).
- I really loved my female Highelf Paladin in Vanguard, but thats the only case I ever liked playing a Highelf.
- Woodelf are the elven version of Dwarves, basically. Disliked playing them every time I tried.
- I like playing Healers, Tanks, Mages and Bards. I dont really like Rogue, even less Ranger, and I really dont like playing Druid. I absolutely adored the Lineage 2 Tyrant, a class I have missed in all other games ever since. I loved the Vanguard Blood Mage, too. The Dread Knight was another Vanguard class I massively enjoyed and will miss forever.
In a lot of MMO's I do play as human but that's normally to do with the game itself I would prefer to avoid and normally look for a Dwarf race or giant race. However I also look at character animation once I get in game if there movement/animations are bad then I cant play it as I'm going to spend most my time looking at my characters back which Is why I generally end up as human because there movement and animations are normally the most fleshed out.
Edit: One thing I cant stand is Tails don't know why but I hate it think it looks awful even when I see someone else character in the world if they have a tail I always hate the look. Would like the option in future MMO's for race's that generally have tails to have a option to remove then in character customization. For example argonian in ES love the lizard look of the head but cant play one because of the tail. I know its weird. I wonder how many other people have one thing that will put them off playing a race.
I have a tendency to look down on "human" players as somewhat unintelligent or lacking creativity. Except in their names of course since most human players are called things like "BuyMe" "Walmart" "BigAss" "Fuck1234" etc. I get the impression people pick human because they don't have any damn imagination! Reading short comments like: "I always choose human," with no explanation as to WHY doesn't help that impression.
I, of course, am drow or elf. Because we're smarter than you mortals! Na na na na na.
Well, since this thread has turned from "why play a human if you're not forced to" to "what do you like to play":
- I always play what D&D calls "lawful good". Just what I am in reallife, too. I dont roleplay much, if at all. I do however create a "real" person, with a good name etc. I really dont like it when the game forces me to play evil "because you're a darkelf" or some such garbage. Just because I am race X doesnt change the fact I am sentient and have free will, thank you very much.
- I play male and female characters about equally. Sorry, but I happen to love women. Thus I dont see whats the problem with me playing one, just because I'm a man. If YOU have a problem with that, well sorry, but thats really exclusively your own problem alone, and not mine. I dont identify with my female characters, but then again I dont identify with most of my male characters either. They are just people to me, people I created with my mind, but people nevertheless. I often pick one of my characters and identify with him a little bit, though. But thats one special character, usually my main, and only if I really feel comfortable with the game. That means for example that I can make him a darkelf and make him look great.
- I want to look great. That doesnt automatically mean beautiful. But it means stylish. I want my Orcs to look ugly, but also very male and heroic. So for example give them a strong chin, and strong eyebrows. Kind of like the player Halforc in the D&D 3.0 and 3.5 Player Handbooks. So make them have no nose whatsoever, just a hole, but dont give them ugly knobs for a nose. First they cant breathe through that and second it seriously lacks in respect to heroism. In general dont make them look like a pig, and like a really ugly pig on top of that. I dont mind pig races, but then give them a matching beautiful rosa skin. Thats why I hated Vanguard orcs, they always looked truely ugly. My Vanguard Goblin though was fine - ugly, sure, but with a bit of twiddling I managed a heroic look.
- I love playing underdog races. My favorite is darkelf. I really hate it though if the devs make the skin so black you cant really see facial features anymore (Darkelves in Neverwinter Nights 2). I rather want a grayish, violettish or blueish tone in the skin. I also hate it when elves are simply outright ugly (Baldurs Gate, Neverwinter Nights 2, Elder Scrolls etc).
- Other underdog races I like playing are gnomes, orc or halforc, and halfelf.
- I dont like it when darkelves are considered black people, orcs are plants or any such garbage. Darkelves are black skinned and red eyed because they are cursed for their anchestors turned to dark magic. The dark of their skin doesnt protect them from direct sunlight at all, and it also basically blinds them. Orcs are people too, and people are sentient. Thus they are not plants or any such stupid thing. Just leave all illogical sentient races to where they belong to (Star Trek: Voyager) and move on.
- I especially really hate animal races that do not even have room for a sentient brain in their head. Thats a major insult to basic common sense. I'm looking at you, Vanguard.
- I dont like non-underdog races much, like human, highelf, woodelf, and especially I strongly dislike dwarf.
- I really, really hate it when games try to force you playing halflings and/or gnomes as a kind of shorter dwarf.
- The only dwarves I ever loved playing have been Lineage 2 female dwarves. Thats because they looked to me like I want gnomes to look like. Also I had no choice, I wanted a crafter and in Lineage 2, only dwarf can be crafter.
- I only play human if the game outright forces me, because all other races are b*s* ugly (Neverwinter Nights 2), or if they are really beautiful (Breton in Elder Scrolls).
- I really loved my female Highelf Paladin in Vanguard, but thats the only case I ever liked playing a Highelf.
- Woodelf are the elven version of Dwarves, basically. Disliked playing them every time I tried.
- I like playing Healers, Tanks, Mages and Bards. I dont really like Rogue, even less Ranger, and I really dont like playing Druid. I absolutely adored the Lineage 2 Tyrant, a class I have missed in all other games ever since. I loved the Vanguard Blood Mage, too. The Dread Knight was another Vanguard class I massively enjoyed and will miss forever.
I always played characters in EQ as the opposite of what the game defined. For instance I played a good Dark Elf Necromancer. The problem with this is it goes completely against lore and culture. If everyone is playing a good Dark Elf then it defeats the purpose of having any lore in the first place. It also makes playing humans more or less pointless unless you like their appearance. Perhaps race is a bad description of what is being chosen at character creation when choosing a race. If you choose a Dark Elf that grew up with humans that would be different, but the possibility of that happening with all the justified racism against Dark Elves is not likely. It's far more likely they would be forced to grow up in their homeland (where they are accepted) and accept the normal culture of Dark Elves. The same for other races in the game. In a MMORPG it's silly to make exceptions to the rule because then everyone is doing it and it makes no sense. If you want to choose to be good, evil, or neutral it's better to play as a human IMO.
I've always wondered this. Since you're a human in real life, what is the draw of playing one in an MMO when there are other races available? I find it interesting the number of humans you see in games like WoW, GW2, and now in Elder Scrolls Online. I usually stay away from them for something more interesting (though in defense of ESO, there are several "human" races so it's harder to stick with the more unusual ones).
Is it because of the racial benefits of the game? Or perhaps you don't like the look of the other fantasy races?
Anyway, I'm curious. So, tell me what your reasons are for playing (or not playing) a human character in a game that has other races.
Hahahaha, I never play any other race than Human. To me, playing an MMO, regardless that I am "Human" in real life, I like to make my character look like me in game, as if I were "in" the game, it's about the feeling of immersion. I never take attention to the racial benefit, it's really just about giving my self the feel of immersion, since it is a virtual world.
I don't usually play humans, but if I do its usually because they are better animated, or have more customisation options, or just generally look better
It seems most people choose their race based on appearance. That's fine, but it confirms my opinion that race is meaningless in today's fantasy games other then being a different skin to wear. The race you pick used to be more about choosing a different culture and thought process. Now it's I want to look like a super model so I'm choosing the elf. That's OK, but it's not very RPG or fantasy. It pretty much disregards the lore as well.
I almost never play a human. I play whatever is the best looking and has the coolest cosmetic appeal.
Couldn't care less about stats and racial abilities, I do care about if there's some cool racial only mount, but usually its all about the color of the hair and the hair styles available. I usually play elves and animal races ). I love beautiful colors and uniqueness. Anything that is different from the norm.
In that way I can relate to any non-human race better than to any human one, because I'm an individual and I don't fit in with society's "norms".
So yes, it is all how you view "beauty". Your perception, some people think humans are beautiful and some think they are drab and boring or ugly. If you think cats are ugly, or if you think they are cute and adorable. If you're crazy obsessed about having colorful hair and attire along with long pointy ears, or if you prefer realism.
Yeah Humans are the most relatable race imo. The other races are just sidekick material for the most part. Other races typically just take some human characteristic and blow it up to some extreme (Strong, Nature-Loving, Agile, Greedy, Stubborn, Sadistic, Intelligent).
So it's just usually a skin and some archetypal image that are used, and I don't find that all that huge a difference. I don't mind the other races, but I normally play humans primarily.
MMORPG players are often like Hobbits: They don't like Adventures
Honestly for me, its mainly because of the look of the armor.
No matter what game i'm playing, usually the armor that is modeled for humans will look the best/most appealing 9 times out of 10. Take WoW for instance: most armor sets, IMO, look better on a human/still look good on a human. Even when you get a "human-like race" like blood elf, blood elves still have their ears sticking out, and when if i'm running around as a death knight and want to be completely covered in dark armor, I don't need some wierd aspect of my race sticking out, ruining the look. Sounds silly, but thats just the way I am.
There is also of course always the aspect that humans are going to be "balanced", so they won't be good at just one thing, but can do anything (although not necessarily the best). I can almost always get away with playing a human as any class and it still be very viable.
I rarely play human in mmos (for the same OP reason taht im a human in real life so i get bored of humans fast in games)
BUT any race (including humans) that i choose in an mmo is based on some factors. The looks of the character, and the story behind their race in the game world. This is why i rarely play mmos where everyone starts in the same place, because that makes the variety of races dull and just a cosmetic thing. Keep each race selection to their racial starting area and their own storyline and ill play your game.
This leads to a bigger topic such as the starting zones. There are cases where the lore of the game for some reason keep all races at the same place (TERA and RIFT to name a few). This design is the hardest to make because it has to be so very well done to not feel boring with other characters. Most of the time devs dont put the effort to make them good. These two games did not do a good job there, at all. It would have been much better to at least send their races to different regions as settlers to start there after the tutorial.
Race topic is much wider than just picking a race to play with.
I've always disliked playing as a human and find it rather boring. Whenever I have a choice, I try to play something else. ESO offers some good choices, but the racials are important -- from my experience. For example, I want to play as an Argonian, but they don't have the racials that would help me compared to the other classes.
Comments
Characters for me are cast members. I tend to role play them right from the start, at creation and how I plan to play them out is determined by what I choose in character creation.
The most common for me are Valkyrie like females that tend to be human like. Quiet male observer types are common too. They will have a personality and with other races there tend to be focused personalities I wasn't associating with my character. As appealing as Castanic were, I never really played a Female Castanic. Hobbit didn't have the qualities I tend to role play in to my characters, as much as I loved Miqo'te the look, I never played one. In ESO an Orc looked grand but they had a social structure I knew I couldn't role play to truth. Wood Elf and High Elf I could.
Less about look, more about back story.
Well, since this thread has turned from "why play a human if you're not forced to" to "what do you like to play":
- I always play what D&D calls "lawful good". Just what I am in reallife, too. I dont roleplay much, if at all. I do however create a "real" person, with a good name etc. I really dont like it when the game forces me to play evil "because you're a darkelf" or some such garbage. Just because I am race X doesnt change the fact I am sentient and have free will, thank you very much.
- I play male and female characters about equally. Sorry, but I happen to love women. Thus I dont see whats the problem with me playing one, just because I'm a man. If YOU have a problem with that, well sorry, but thats really exclusively your own problem alone, and not mine. I dont identify with my female characters, but then again I dont identify with most of my male characters either. They are just people to me, people I created with my mind, but people nevertheless. I often pick one of my characters and identify with him a little bit, though. But thats one special character, usually my main, and only if I really feel comfortable with the game. That means for example that I can make him a darkelf and make him look great.
- I want to look great. That doesnt automatically mean beautiful. But it means stylish. I want my Orcs to look ugly, but also very male and heroic. So for example give them a strong chin, and strong eyebrows. Kind of like the player Halforc in the D&D 3.0 and 3.5 Player Handbooks. So make them have no nose whatsoever, just a hole, but dont give them ugly knobs for a nose. First they cant breathe through that and second it seriously lacks in respect to heroism. In general dont make them look like a pig, and like a really ugly pig on top of that. I dont mind pig races, but then give them a matching beautiful rosa skin. Thats why I hated Vanguard orcs, they always looked truely ugly. My Vanguard Goblin though was fine - ugly, sure, but with a bit of twiddling I managed a heroic look.
- I love playing underdog races. My favorite is darkelf. I really hate it though if the devs make the skin so black you cant really see facial features anymore (Darkelves in Neverwinter Nights 2). I rather want a grayish, violettish or blueish tone in the skin. I also hate it when elves are simply outright ugly (Baldurs Gate, Neverwinter Nights 2, Elder Scrolls etc).
- Other underdog races I like playing are gnomes, orc or halforc, and halfelf.
- I dont like it when darkelves are considered black people, orcs are plants or any such garbage. Darkelves are black skinned and red eyed because they are cursed for their anchestors turned to dark magic. The dark of their skin doesnt protect them from direct sunlight at all, and it also basically blinds them. Orcs are people too, and people are sentient. Thus they are not plants or any such stupid thing. Just leave all illogical sentient races to where they belong to (Star Trek: Voyager) and move on.
- I especially really hate animal races that do not even have room for a sentient brain in their head. Thats a major insult to basic common sense. I'm looking at you, Vanguard.
- I dont like non-underdog races much, like human, highelf, woodelf, and especially I strongly dislike dwarf.
- I really, really hate it when games try to force you playing halflings and/or gnomes as a kind of shorter dwarf.
- The only dwarves I ever loved playing have been Lineage 2 female dwarves. Thats because they looked to me like I want gnomes to look like. Also I had no choice, I wanted a crafter and in Lineage 2, only dwarf can be crafter.
- I only play human if the game outright forces me, because all other races are b*s* ugly (Neverwinter Nights 2), or if they are really beautiful (Breton in Elder Scrolls).
- I really loved my female Highelf Paladin in Vanguard, but thats the only case I ever liked playing a Highelf.
- Woodelf are the elven version of Dwarves, basically. Disliked playing them every time I tried.
- I like playing Healers, Tanks, Mages and Bards. I dont really like Rogue, even less Ranger, and I really dont like playing Druid. I absolutely adored the Lineage 2 Tyrant, a class I have missed in all other games ever since. I loved the Vanguard Blood Mage, too. The Dread Knight was another Vanguard class I massively enjoyed and will miss forever.
For me I normally play a dwarf.. if there is no dwarf available I play as a Human...
In a lot of MMO's I do play as human but that's normally to do with the game itself I would prefer to avoid and normally look for a Dwarf race or giant race. However I also look at character animation once I get in game if there movement/animations are bad then I cant play it as I'm going to spend most my time looking at my characters back which Is why I generally end up as human because there movement and animations are normally the most fleshed out.
Edit: One thing I cant stand is Tails don't know why but I hate it think it looks awful even when I see someone else character in the world if they have a tail I always hate the look. Would like the option in future MMO's for race's that generally have tails to have a option to remove then in character customization. For example argonian in ES love the lizard look of the head but cant play one because of the tail. I know its weird. I wonder how many other people have one thing that will put them off playing a race.
i play human if i think they're the only race that fits the class i picked.
i dont really have a bias towards any particular race i just like to match them with the class i'm playing.
I had fun once, it was terrible.
I have a tendency to look down on "human" players as somewhat unintelligent or lacking creativity. Except in their names of course since most human players are called things like "BuyMe" "Walmart" "BigAss" "Fuck1234" etc. I get the impression people pick human because they don't have any damn imagination! Reading short comments like: "I always choose human," with no explanation as to WHY doesn't help that impression.
I, of course, am drow or elf. Because we're smarter than you mortals! Na na na na na.
Because Humans, Fuck yeah!
Seriously there's a trend of this on imgur. 19 pages worth. http://imgur.com/gallery/6p75M
Read all that. You'll be rolling human in no time.
I always played characters in EQ as the opposite of what the game defined. For instance I played a good Dark Elf Necromancer. The problem with this is it goes completely against lore and culture. If everyone is playing a good Dark Elf then it defeats the purpose of having any lore in the first place. It also makes playing humans more or less pointless unless you like their appearance. Perhaps race is a bad description of what is being chosen at character creation when choosing a race. If you choose a Dark Elf that grew up with humans that would be different, but the possibility of that happening with all the justified racism against Dark Elves is not likely. It's far more likely they would be forced to grow up in their homeland (where they are accepted) and accept the normal culture of Dark Elves. The same for other races in the game. In a MMORPG it's silly to make exceptions to the rule because then everyone is doing it and it makes no sense. If you want to choose to be good, evil, or neutral it's better to play as a human IMO.
Hahahaha, I never play any other race than Human. To me, playing an MMO, regardless that I am "Human" in real life, I like to make my character look like me in game, as if I were "in" the game, it's about the feeling of immersion. I never take attention to the racial benefit, it's really just about giving my self the feel of immersion, since it is a virtual world.
human forever only play humans best race worldwide
why would i want to play a furry animal or a dwarf or blue skin alien?
no thanks
I almost never play a human. I play whatever is the best looking and has the coolest cosmetic appeal.
Couldn't care less about stats and racial abilities, I do care about if there's some cool racial only mount, but usually its all about the color of the hair and the hair styles available. I usually play elves and animal races ). I love beautiful colors and uniqueness. Anything that is different from the norm.
In that way I can relate to any non-human race better than to any human one, because I'm an individual and I don't fit in with society's "norms".
So yes, it is all how you view "beauty". Your perception, some people think humans are beautiful and some think they are drab and boring or ugly. If you think cats are ugly, or if you think they are cute and adorable. If you're crazy obsessed about having colorful hair and attire along with long pointy ears, or if you prefer realism.
Yeah Humans are the most relatable race imo. The other races are just sidekick material for the most part. Other races typically just take some human characteristic and blow it up to some extreme (Strong, Nature-Loving, Agile, Greedy, Stubborn, Sadistic, Intelligent).
So it's just usually a skin and some archetypal image that are used, and I don't find that all that huge a difference. I don't mind the other races, but I normally play humans primarily.
The reasons people choose their selected race is variable and often matches the players gaming style :-
Roleplayers : These will choose the race that matches their character concept
Power Gamers : these will choose the race which gives the best bonuses for their intended build
General Gamer : mostly base their choice on build and looks
pervert : basically will choose according to their tastes ....
lunatic : will randomly choose one cackling insanely
masocist : will choose the worst possible match to their build for the added pain
etc etc.
In short the reason people choose a human is because they feel like it.
Honestly for me, its mainly because of the look of the armor.
No matter what game i'm playing, usually the armor that is modeled for humans will look the best/most appealing 9 times out of 10. Take WoW for instance: most armor sets, IMO, look better on a human/still look good on a human. Even when you get a "human-like race" like blood elf, blood elves still have their ears sticking out, and when if i'm running around as a death knight and want to be completely covered in dark armor, I don't need some wierd aspect of my race sticking out, ruining the look. Sounds silly, but thats just the way I am.
There is also of course always the aspect that humans are going to be "balanced", so they won't be good at just one thing, but can do anything (although not necessarily the best). I can almost always get away with playing a human as any class and it still be very viable.
I rarely play human in mmos (for the same OP reason taht im a human in real life so i get bored of humans fast in games)
BUT any race (including humans) that i choose in an mmo is based on some factors. The looks of the character, and the story behind their race in the game world. This is why i rarely play mmos where everyone starts in the same place, because that makes the variety of races dull and just a cosmetic thing. Keep each race selection to their racial starting area and their own storyline and ill play your game.
This leads to a bigger topic such as the starting zones. There are cases where the lore of the game for some reason keep all races at the same place (TERA and RIFT to name a few). This design is the hardest to make because it has to be so very well done to not feel boring with other characters. Most of the time devs dont put the effort to make them good. These two games did not do a good job there, at all. It would have been much better to at least send their races to different regions as settlers to start there after the tutorial.
Race topic is much wider than just picking a race to play with.
I've always disliked playing as a human and find it rather boring. Whenever I have a choice, I try to play something else. ESO offers some good choices, but the racials are important -- from my experience. For example, I want to play as an Argonian, but they don't have the racials that would help me compared to the other classes.